“Thank you. I wanted someone to give him a voice besides me and you did that,” the victim’s daughter told me after the capital murder trial. When people think of the Mexican border they think of drugs. It’s true this man was murdered because he failed to pay his drug suppliers (tied to cartels) and his drug runners, but there was so much more to his life than drugs. Eight children wondered for 15 years if it was possible that their father abandoned them. Now, 17 years and 3 convictions later, they are finally planning a memorial service so they may say goodbye with the dignity stolen from them so long ago.
Prosecutors along the 2000 mile US-Mexican border give voice to more than murder victims. We also help victims of human trafficking. Federal Agents discovered a 13 year old girl with a man previously convicted of raping a child because her mother sold her to him for $20. Because of a jurisdictional technicality they could not hold him or her. Because I spent months building a relationship with these Agents, they called me. I came up with a plan, but it had to be executed by another agency. The territorial pissing contests among law enforcement agencies are legendary. I’ve worked for years to overcome those boundaries here. They may not trust each other, but they trust me. As a result the second agency executed my plan and a child was saved.
That was domestic trafficking, but here on the border we have international human trafficking – and not just Mexican victims. I’ve worked the case of a child brought here illegally from the Dominican Republic with entry made illegally through Mexico. She too was sold by her mother, but this time for a green card. When the green card was obtained, mom went to New York and left her child as the man’s housekeeper, cook, and sex slave. That man is in prison now. We’re looking for mom. The child is in counseling and living with a family who wants to adopt her.
To get into America, people who come by way of Mexico must pay “Coyotes” who work for cartels to transport them here illegally. If they by-pass the Coyotes the cartels will kill any family that remains in Mexico and/or will kill them here when they find them. This deters others from by-passing their system. Since there are cartel cells in every state, finding those who fail to pay is not hard. When the Coyote brings them here they retain the victims’ things and they tack on an additional charge not discussed beforehand. They put them in a house with many other illegal immigrants. They charge exorbitant rent. They make the women (who comprise 70% of victims) work off the extra money by prostituting them out or forcing them to make porn. They make the men work it off with forced homosexual prostitution and/or forced manual labor. The rent is so high and wages are so low that the victims can never purchase their freedom. To make them easier to handle, the Coyotes will force feed the immigrants illegal drugs which forces them into more debt as they get hooked. To control the younger ones they give the child a puppy and when the child won’t do what is demanded, the puppy is beaten or killed in front of the child. The immigrants’ only hope is that law enforcement discovers them. Of course they won’t call 911 because that could get their loved ones or themselves killed.
On Monday I referenced a blog that said that border prosecutors are a waste of money. It talked about a unit in Texas that was funded for 2 years with $1 million per year for 18 attorneys (according to information I got via telephone) in 16 jurisdictions that cover 1250 miles of the almost 2000 mile US-Mexico border. That money pays for salaries, training, and educating officers and the community in how to detect human and drug trafficking. In 2009, the unit’s funding amounted to 0.0010% of the total budget. $75.5 BILLION (41.5% of the budget) was spent on education. Under the proposed 2011 budget the unit would be 0.0012% of the total budget. $70.5 BILLION (42%) is budgeted for education. In 2010, the federal government spent $3.72 trillion on US-Mexico border security and it was all slated for additional Agents and soldiers. Without attorneys in the courtroom, the work started by Agents and Soldiers cannot be finished.
Trafficking victims are not kept at the border. They are in every state because the cartels are in every state. What I do here affects your neighborhood and our families. Texas and other states along with the federal government spend billions annually on domestic welfare. Why shouldn’t 1 state spend 1 million each year to help train, empower, and pay special prosecutors so they may give voice to these most hopeless victims? Does the welfare of the invisible not matter?
What about those who say it is a waste of time and money to fight the drug problem in America? Remember the child sold for $20? She was sold because her mom needed to buy her drug of choice. It’s not uncommon for drug-addicted parents to sell their children, no matter the age, to get a hit. Around 85% of the child rape cases I’ve worked had drugs as an underlying factor. The other 15% were just sickos. Almost 100% of home invasions, robberies, and burglaries I’ve worked had drugs as an underlying factor. According to the FBI 80% of crime in America is perpetrated by gangs. Gangs’ major source of income is running drugs in America and their ties to the cartels are getting stronger every day. Will we ever be able to completely win the “war on drugs”? No, but shouldn’t we still fight? If YOU were for sale would you want me to keep fighting?
“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” ~ Edmund Burke
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